Ernie Cabreana, 86, is the oldest member of the Bikerdahan. CONTRIBUTED PHOTOS
LOS ANGELES – In 1948 teenage rebel-icon James Dean rode his first-ever motorbike, the Whizzer. The youthful amateur boxer Ernie Cabreana, now 86, also revved through the streets of Guadalupe up north on a similar bike model.
Fast forward to 2016 Cabreana still rides, but now on a restored powerful vintage ’78 Trike, which takes him to the nearest stores a few miles away from his home in Santa Maria, as well as to more than 300 miles of cruising to Los Angeles or Las Vegas.
Cabreana marks his 68th year of riding up and down the coasts of California and as far as New Mexico this year. If he’s not going to listen to his doctor’s advice to stay home instead, he will meet up once more with some 500 other Filipino American bikers from September 9 to 11 at Lake Don Pedro in La Grange, California, in what is billed as the “8th Annual Bikerdahan.”
Cabreana joined the U.S. Army during the Korean War, but he is embraced by biker groups not just as a veteran of war, but also of many US biker rallies.
Pete ” El Kapitan” Lacson, organizer of Birkadahan, rallies the 2012 Las Vegas Bikerdahan crowd.
“Bikerdahan 2016” is expected to gather more than 500 to celebrate the unique experience of being a Fil-Am biker in the freeway capital of the US,” said Peter Lacson a photojournalist from the former GTV-4 News Center in Metro manila.
An avid motorcyclist himself (he rides an Indian), Lacson in 2003 organized the JuandelaCruisers, a Fil-Am riding club based in Southern California. Biker groups call him their “El Kapitan” having led the formation of the annual Bikerdahan.
Lacson’s JuandelaCruisers launched the first Bikerdahan in the Sequoia National Park located south of Sierra Nevada in Tulare County from August 15 to 17, 2009.
The first Birkadahan organization meeting in 2007 at the Guadalupe Cultural Center run by Joe Talaugon and his wife, Margie ( middle, seated ).
Lacson, who just retired from his post as senior photo technician and supervisor at the UC Southern Regional Library Facility Preservation Imaging Services, said he met Cabreana in 2007 at the Guadalupe Cultural Center.
Together with riders from San Jose, they rendezvoused at the Cultural Center to also meet the husband-and-wife team of “Manong” Joe Talaugon and “Manang” Margie Talaugon of the Filipino American National Historical Society (FANHS) both proprietors of the Cultural Center.
Cabreana, fondly referred to as “Manong Ernie,” told INQUIRER.net how he got his first tiny motorbike, the “Whizzer,” around 1948, when he was fresh out of high school.
Bikerdahan annual gathering with their families.
“It came out of my penchant for bartering and adventure,” he recalled. I was also so impressed with the daredevil image of the ‘Hells Angels’ who rode the streets of my town and I decided to part with my prized zoot suit or ‘pachuco’ outfit in exchange for that small motorcycle. I got the pachuco from a Mexican guy and traded it for my .22 rifle, which I had acquired earlier through in exchange for my bicycle. I had bought the bicycle out my measly salary as a nursery helper.”
Speaking with Manong Ernie is like flipping through the history of Filipino Americans immigration waves in the United States. He was born in a farm labor camp in Lompoc where his mother, then 16, and father, 18, had worked together, coming from the plantations in Hawaii, site of the first wave of Filipinos immigration in the early 1900s.
When the Korean War broke out in 1950, Manong Ernie decided to volunteer for the U.S. Army where his pugilistic prowess was tested and he was celebrated as a “welterweight champion.”
“I didn’t have to do mess hall duties as every Wednesday, I would be summoned to fight,” he laughed. That seems to be the mark of his life, taking on dangerous challenges, which he does to this day as a rider. His wife passed on several years ago. One of his children, Robin, runs a farm out in Oregon.
In a YouTube interview, first generation Fil-Am Vincent Paderes of “Pamilya Mabuhay” confirmed that Bikerdahan is the biggest gathering of Fil-Am bikers in the US. “Bikers from California and Nevada gather to share food, music, fun and stories, making Bikerdahan a much sought-after bike rally. All Fil-Am bikers look forward to Bikerdahan and hope to eventually pass it down as a tradition to the succeeding generations.”
Ernie Cabreana (extreme left seated) and his fellow Kayumanggi riding club members.
To Lacson, the fiesta-like gaiety that pervades any Bikerdahan has become “an authentic cultural substructure, helping Fil-Ams re-define their natural tendency towards the familial.”
He added: “The Fil-Am biker returns to Bikerdahan every year to renew his identity and sense of belonging to a familial village. At the same time he also secures for himself a sense of arrival and advantage in the larger riding public.”
The Fil-Am riders of Bikerdahan are mostly professionals; many are engineers, according to Lacson. Their ages range from the 20s to the late 80s like Cabreana.
What keeps Lacson’s enthusiasm is not only “riding the wind” for adventure and conviviality, but also getting to meet the pillars of the historical society from Central California, who are riders themselves and who rallied around the FANHS’ cause of disseminating the history and culture of the Filipino Americans in the US.
Bikerdahan’s special brand of camaraderie is so infectious that through the succeeding seven years it has been remounted in three other California nature parks and a Las Vegas casino. By its’ second year, Bikerdahan’s club roster more than doubled from the original four–Juandelacruisers, Fil-Am Riders, Kayumanggi Riding Club and Pinoy Harley Riders Club—with six additional Fil-Am riding groups. Bikerdahan 2011, which was hosted by San Jose based Fil-Am Riders, took place In Lake Isabella Camp in Kern County. This was the same venue for the previous host—Pinoy Harley Riders Club.
There are now 15 groups in the Bikerdahan with the addition of one club outside California, the Filipino Riders from Las Vegas, Nevada. Filipino Riders of Las Vegas hosted Bikerdahan 2012 in Prim Valley Resort and Casino.
Daly City’s “Crispy Pata” took charge of Bikerdahan 2013 and brought it back to an outdoors venue, this time in Lake Don Pedro, La Grange. Stockton’s “Respect the Brotherhood” hosted Bikerdahan 2014 and opted to use the same Don Pedro camp. In 2015, “Pamilya Mabuhay,” from up North, chose Lake McSwain, Snelling for their fete.
There may be no marching band, but several garage bands will be performing at any given time during the first night of festivities. A typical scenario in a three-day Birkadahan fest is described by Lacson:
A typical JuanDeLaCruisers day ride (in Lake Isabela).
“It is most evocative of the Hispanic era fiesta. Sites for tent and or RV camping are pre-designated. For the first night of activities, most clubs host open campsite receptions. Any recognized or vouched for riding enthusiast may visit and share in the festivities. By mid-afternoon of the second day, all would gather in the camp’s open-air stage for the grand celebration. The hosting club, Hermano if you will, has a prepared program that will involve games, contests and rituals. Before sundown, professional musicians who are also Fil-Am bikers begin performing on the camp’s open-air stage. After rousing the crowd, the hosting club’s cusinero del fiesta opens the buffet tables for dinner. Dinner fare is strictly Filipino, with four large vats of Calrose rice positioned strategically around the party venue.”
Since 2004, the Juancheros have donated their time and money to five US and three Philippine-based charities. They have participated four times in the local Toy Run for the Los Angeles Children’s Hospital. In 2011 they hosted two dance benefits called Thunder on the Floor, whose proceeds went to St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital in Emeryville, California.
Beyond commitment to adventure, the bikers also have looked out for the Philippines. In 2004 and 2010, they organized garage sales in favor of two Philippine beneficiaries, namely “Bantay Bata” and “Tulong sa Barrio.” When Ondoy devastated the Philippines in September 2009, the Juancheros, along with Pinoy Harley Riders Club, orchestrated a series of events for the benefit of the Philippine Red Cross.